On Thursday, educators in 171 South Australian schools will go on strike for the second time in the past two months after the state government’s “disappointing” offer was turned down by the Australian Education Union.
The AEU claimed on Monday that it would make educators “worse off” in the long run if it approved a 5% pay hike. Eighty-three percent of union members voted in favour of strike action last week.
According to a statement from the president of the AEU South Australian section, Andrew Gohl, “this offer is essentially the same as, if not worse than, the last.”
“We have been in negotiations with the Government since initiating industrial action in September, and we anticipated that today’s offer would take those conversations into account.
“Under these conditions, teachers in some schools still won’t see any real workload relief for seven years, and by that time, half will have already left the profession.”
September strikes were called after 80% of members voted in favour of taking industrial action.
On Thursday, the strike will begin at 11.30 a.m. The Department of Education offices will be the meeting place for union members, who will march to Parliament House.
Thursday’s demonstration will be the second in as many months after the September work stoppage that affected 167 public schools and preschools.
On Thursday, 171 schools in the state would be impacted. You can find the complete list of affected preschools and schools here.
After turning down a state government offer that would have raised teachers’ pay by 5%, union members went on strike. Under the terms of their new enterprise agreement, the AEU is requesting a wage increase of 8.6% in the first year and 5.5% in the next two.
According to the union, low wages are the reason behind the decline in teaching staff. “We were astounded that the government neither made a significant increase in salary nor brought back the implementation for the period of one hour of non-instruction time to address workload,” Gohl said during a press conference on Tuesday.
“What the government put on the table yesterday was a worsening of financial outcomes in the third offer, and contentment to see teachers working excessive hours for the next three years.” Gohl further asserted that for the past year, 1800 pupils have not had a steady instructor.
In addition, the union is requesting legislative safeguards against abuse by parents, improved in-class assistance, and tenure for preschool teachers and principals. Since July 2023, the unions have been promoting higher wages.
Blair Boyer, the minister of education, expressed his disappointment that the union did not decide to end the strike despite offering to enhance wages by 5% in the first year, 3% in the second year, and 2.5% in the third year of the enterprise agreement.
“I definitely wasn’t expecting the strike action to go ahead I was honestly shocked to hear that,” Boyer stated on Tuesday. “This is unquestionably a better offer…I had anticipated that the strike would be called off once we informed them of our offer yesterday, but that hasn’t happened.”
“They [the union] put a figure out of 8.6 per cent salary increase which … we cannot do, we moved on our offer three times now, the union’s position today is the same as it was in July, they need to come to the party as well, we are bending over backwards here.”
According to the minister, the government would have to pay an additional $70 million year for one hour of compensated non-teaching time.
Boyer also rejected the union’s argument that their proposal would make things worse for teachers.
Boyer stated that even though schools are closed on Thursday, the SACE exams for accounting and physics will still take place.
